Fired New York educator accepts Seattle post

Published 4:00 am, Friday, January 7, 2000

Ending speculation that Rudy Crew was interested in heading San Francisco's public school system, the former New York chancellor has accepted a long-standing offer to run a new institute at the University of Washington in Seattle.

Crew, who in New York headed the nation's largest school system and was a runner-up in the 1992 search for a superintendent in San Francisco, was hired Thursday as the first executive director of the university's K-12 Leadership Institute. In development since 1998, the academy will provide training for aspiring and established principals, superintendents and other school leaders. Crew is expected to begin the $175,000-a-year job Feb. 1.

The New York school board voted on Christmas Eve not to extend Crew's contract - apparently because of a bitter rift between him and Mayor Rudolph Giuliani. He was immediately named by Mayor Willie Brown and Supervisor Amos Brown as a leading candidate for San Francisco's top education post.

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"This is a great loss to San Francisco," Supervisor Brown said upon hearing the news of Crew's new post. "It's a sad day. There is no one else with Rudy Crew's stature and ability to handle a diverse setting and faculty, and work with the folks in Sacramento. He's a man with an impeccable record and credentials."

San Francisco school board members, however, were not as quick to embrace Crew, saying a process had been set up to search for a superintendent. The position has been open for seven months, since former Superintendent Bill Rojas left to run Dallas' school system.

"I'm surprised and I'm not surprised," said San Francisco Board of Education President Juanita Owens. "I'm surprised because I thought Rudy was actively interested in San Francisco. I'm not surprised because he has family in the Seattle area. What this tells me, though, is that our search is taking too long. It has been stalled. And, we've lost out on an opportunity to have one of the most recognized superintendents in the country come to San Francisco."

Board member Mary Hernandez was less concerned with the lost opportunity, saying, "We have

already had 30 requests for applications," Hernandez said. "We've got a process in place. We're just not at a stage where anyone has been reviewed as a candidate or top candidate. I hadn't had time to even consider Rudy Crew."

The district is currently being run by interim Superintendent Linda Davis, who has taken herself out of consideration for the permanent job.

$50,000 search under way

The San Francisco school district has paid the California School Boards Association in Sacramento $50,000 to conduct the search for a permanent superintendent. A new superintendent is expected to be named by June.

Board President Owens, however, thinks a superintendent should be hired in late April or early May. "The superintendent should be on board before May, which is when budget development starts," Owens said. "Also, the CSBA has set March 10 as the closing date for applications for the job. I want to move the closing date up into February. We've already lost one candidate. I don't want to lose others."

Crew, 49, who maintains a home outside Tacoma and has two children at the University of Washington, had one of the longest tenures of any recent New York City chancellor.

While leading the district of 1.1 million students, Crew ended the automatic promotion of failing students, changed the practice of giving lifelong job protection to principals and persuaded the state Legislature to give the chancellor more say over the appointment of local superintendents. &lt;